Exhuming No-Contact Grief, Planting Seeds for Trans Joy
CW: mention of narcissistic abuse
December 14th, 2021 was my 5 year anniversary of my first testosterone shot.
I knew on December 14th, 2016 that the Christmas I had with my family that year would
probably be the last one. By the time I had come to that moment, as the plunger to the
syringe containing my first dose of life saving testosterone descended, I had already
gone through at least four unsuccessful attempts at coming out to them as some kind of
not-cisgender, not-heterosexual. I was nearly 24. I’d gotten an engineering degree; I’d
begun my first career as a microbiologist, and I was living on my own and paying all my
own bills, despite their resistance to let me get my own apartment, after a year of
working as a scientist.
There was a part of me that hoped, once I came out, that my parents would give up the
fight of trying to cram me into the “heterosexual woman” box and take a moment to say,
“well, I guess that doesn’t fit our child. Maybe we should see what form they actually
take?”
Some families do. Some parents realize their mistake and change course. Mine, last I
checked, still have not had that moment to this day.
"The Holidays" have always been complicated for me. December was usually the time
that I was most trapped with my narcissistic* family. As I came into adolescence and
began discovering myself, and my queerness became more apparent, my role as the
scapegoat solidified.
Growing up queer, in a conservative, abusive household, I never had the experience of
Christmas being a time of childlike joy. I was not excited or relieved to be out of school.
Not being in school meant being home, where I was vigilantly watched at all times for
signs of deviation from the norm, and the privacy of my journals was constantly at risk of
being violated. Presents seemed to always come with the threat, “You better not
embarrass me after all I’ve given you.” All memories of positive shared moments with
family were darkened by a sinister vignette of “You know they don’t love the real you,
right?”
***
After I broke up with my non-affirming family, my new freedom did not breathe life into
my stunted Christmas cheer – and now there was grief on top of the absence of happy
childhood memories. For the first few years, that grief was a gaping, ever aching wound
that seemed to split open further each December. I was now cut off from my entire
biological family. My dad and I would never make up for lost “male-bonding” time; my
mom would never tell folks at church how proud she is of her sons. I wouldn’t be able to
be there for my little brother as he was coming into adulthood right behind me. I had no
way to contact any grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles. I had entirely severed
myself from my family tree and I felt how rootless I was.
It was 2018 before I thought I might have a chance at enjoying the holidays. I had been
doing drag for a year at that point, and I had discovered the Christmas Gays™, the kids
that grew up with supportive parents and a fondness for red with white trim in
December. I don’t think I ever fully got into it, but I finally had a reason to crack a smile
when I heard Mariah Carrie. And, I’d been absorbed into my best
friend/roommate/platonic domestic partner’s family, so I had a family Christmas to
attend that made me feel like, maybe, even I could have those Hallmark movie
Christmases. Her family gatherings felt like a kind of love I had never experienced while
spending time with my family. It was loud with rambunctious children and opinionated
aunts and senile grandparents, with tispy uncles and the laugher of cousins who’d
grown up together. There were awkward moments with distant relatives coming up to
us, taking our hands to look in our eyes and say, “You know, it breaks my heart you felt
so alone. We’re here to support you. We’re here to love you.”
It was nice while it lasted.
2020 hit, and large gatherings were put to a halt (as they should have been). December
was just December. I was working both at Starbucks and as a massage therapist, and
honestly, 2020 had brought enough new trauma that I simply didn’t have bandwidth to
even think about old trauma. It was honestly a relief to focus on surviving the moment.
Now here we are, on the 5th anniversary of my first testosterone shot, and it’s another
year of “December is just December.” It doesn’t hurt; it’s not scary. It’s spacious even–
it allows me room to fill my heart with the Triangle Wellness Collective. But, I haven’t
forgotten what it felt like to ache for a reason to have holiday cheer.
I want to make it known that I hold so much appreciation for my queerness for giving me
a reason to believe there has to be something better out there. And I have so much
tender love, so much admiration for the brave, beardless, unaffirmed 23 year old that
stuck in that first testosterone shot 5 years ago today.
So, if you find yourself feeling renewed tenderness from wounds cut open in the month
of December, I want you to know that you’re not alone, and if you find a way to survive
long enough to get away from those who held the knife, eventually those wounds will
stitch themselves back together and that wound will heal. Perhaps there will be
numbness in place of the pain, perhaps your healing journey will take a different turn
than mine and you’ll find that elusive holiday cheer. But, it will eventually stop hurting,
and the other 11 months of the year will have the chance to become deliciously
saturated with color in ways you can’t even imagine yet.
***
*I use the term narcissistic to describe my family after half a decade of trying to figure
out what the heck happened to me, certainly not flippantly
About Andy Prescott:
Andy (he/him) is a queer, polyamorous, proudly effeminate, witchcraft dabbling, transgender man. Andy has two cats, Hades and Persephone, and enjoys running Triangle Wellness Collective, and finding new ways to live like his Stardew Valley farm in his midwest suburban apartment.